Dr Erin Leitao, from the School of Chemical Sciences, is a New Zealand Fellow of the L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science programme and is the only scientist in New Zealand working towards creating new polymeric materials with main-group elements comprising the backbone.

Do cyclists breathe easier on one side of a cycleway barrier than another? How much difference do trees really make to air quality? What happens when we bury natural streams beneath concrete and asphalt? How hard is it for native species to survive in cities?

New Zealand needs major improvements in food policies if it is going to seriously tackle the country’s obesity epidemic, according to findings in the University of Auckland’s second Healthy Food Environment Policy Index (Food-EPI) published today.

In Auckland, Music Therapy New Zealand and the Centre for Brain Research co-facilitated the Music Therapy Week Neurological Choirs Workshop, hosted by Professor Suzanne Purdy, Alison Talmage RMTh and Shari Storie RMTh.

A slater-like crustacean that lives in the sand on Auckland’s Piha beach has provided new evidence that animals have biological clocks influenced by the tide as well as the more familiar circadian clock that follows the day/night cycle and which regulates human behaviour.

What place do the humanities still have in a world where governments and universities are increasingly focused on job skills? What does it mean to be a critical scholar in the age of Trump? In a world where the pressure on women to look a certain way has never been greater?